Cargo Cult - Who is John Frum? He is known to us by many names, this Visitor from Elsewhere, dispenser of endless abundance and wielder of mysterious technologies: John Frum, Quetzalcoatl, Osiris, "Bob." His cargo is splendid, his generosity boundless, his motives beyond our understanding. But across the ages and around the world, the stories all agree: one day he will return, bearing great gifts. Our theme this year asks three related questions; who is John Frum, where is he really from, and where, on spaceship Earth, are we all going?

Was Gilligans' Island a Cargo Cult? Did the professors' devices ever work, or did the castaways enter into group psychosis and believe he could summon battery power with coconuts? Was Skipper eventually sacrificed like Piggy in a Lord of the Flies devolution, or was he elevated like Hurley? For that matter, was Lost a Cargo Cult? Did Star Trek steal Gilligans' red shirt as sacrificial lamb concept?

No it wasn't. Being stranded on an island and making stuff out of found/scavenged objects isn't what makes a cargo cult. The show was about the castaways, and aside from an odd episode or two they didn't have any worshippers. Cargo cult is about the indigenous people who become worshippers. Had there been a spinoff show about a tribe that found their "advanced" gizmos and set up shrines at their old campsite or on the beach where the Minnow ran aground… THAT would have been a cargo cult.

Really, Trilo? Really? They weren't native, but weren't they trying to reconstruct a society and technology they didn't really understand in hopes of attracting the Cargo (rescue was the cargo, a return to their old lives the bounty). Much of what they did seemed implausible and ridiculous, attempts to effect a wealth and technology transfer by mimicking a more advanced civilization? Aren't all cargo cults trying to achieve a level of prosperity and comfort that seems mystical? go!

I think it's an interesting viewpoint. Gilligan's Island's people were from the land where the "cargo" comes from, they weren't mystified and bewildered by it like a primitive culture might be... so in that sense, they aren't quite what this year's theme means. But on the other hand, it's like someone who converts to another religion; they weren't always a primitive tribe but they became one and ended up being somewhat a "cargo cult".If that argument can be made, this year I could re-christen my vessel "Minnow" and get me a tilley hat

GreyCoyote: "At this rate it wont be long before he is Admiral Fukkit."Delle: Singularly we may be dysfunctional misfits, but together we're magic.

I think the original 7 Castaways were not a cargo cult...However let's assume that Gilligan continues to fuck everything up. (That guy, right?!)

Eventually they're going to go get around to goin' down to bonin' town. Assuming that Mary-Ann and Ginger have a bunch of babies, their kids, or their kids kids, might begin to come up with some distorted ideas of what is on those ships that Great-Grandpa Gilligan keeps accidentally sinking/turning away.

However, they'd likely be a Cargo Cargo Cult Cult, all building giant fetishes of coconuts out of ...coconuts.

[I just realized I'd missed this before. I'm giving the thread a nudge over to the theme board since that's a better fit for theme discussion.]

Really, uncle sticky, really. They weren't mimicking a car (or worshipping it) in hopes that some great hope from the sky would come back and bring them gifts and happiness… they were making the coconut car (and other trappings of their former lives) for utility (in the case of the car, transportation). It was a convenience while they were making do on the island, and a part of the tv sitcom's schtick. No part of what the castaways were doing was worship or could be construed as a religion, could it?

Cargo is stuff and things. Rescue is more like exodus and salvation ("take me to heaven, oh lord"). Even if the castaways worshipped that coconut car or any other thing they built (which they did not) or if they prayed regularly for rescue (which they did not - Sherwood Schwartz sitcoms were good like that), simply praying for something doesn't make it a cargo cult in my opinion. That doesn't mean that Gilligan's Island wasn't a great show, and if you want to draw inspiration from it (either visually or conceptually) for something you want to build on the playa don't let that stop you.